Good find, Jack! Yeah, no one loves product placement, but I don't mind it as long as it's done subtly and actually works to help the story along. Besides, it's Iron Man! It would be unlike him NOT to tote around branded products!

If we are indeed seeing Tony utilize the Extremis virus in IM3, and he could therefore control his suits with with his mind alone...he won't need to bring Jarvis along with his armors anymore.

Will Jarvis now be relegated to nothing more than house duties from now on? Seems kind of sad...

Jarvis may still be needed...

Jarvis may be able to help give Tony control over a wider network than the Mandarins and provide a lot of support in the final battle...

He may take direct control of some of the drones Tony was controlling when Tony starts to lose the battle, making him just as valuable an ally because Jarvis's network is connected to all the suits. Tony still needs some verbal communication and someone to act as his eyes and ears for some of the suits he can't visibly see that are being directed to other battle fronts. Jarvis acts like a battle planner and may help Tony AIM the suits. It's one thing to be able to focus on the various pieces of one suit.

However his drone army is made up of leftover pieces from the other suits and needs to be assembled, he can't waste time diverting attention to control all the facets of some of the suits. Some of the suits are a little easier for him to control all at once so he divides control with Jarvis. Keeping in constant contact with what he's allowing Jarvis to do. It would take a lot more concentration to control 40+ suits all at once and their various pieces... Jarvis needs to help him control/AIM some of the suits when his attention needs to be focused on the Mandarin, and the Mandarin is making attacks on multiple fronts. AI again steps up to protect/help him in a new way, because he already trusts jarvis enough to connect him to the Extremis suit, and all the others.... Jarvis is the good AI he can depend on because it proves itself to him...
The same can't be said about other AI that may enter the story.

Tony can control his armor with his mind, and multiple armors at once, but it may be kind of difficult to focus on controlling and AIMing all of them at once to do complicated tasks, and also focusing on the battle right in front of him. Jarvis may lead some of Stark's army, while Stark tells him what to do with them and Jarvis reports on his progress in battle... To add: Jarvis takes control of exactly 7 of the more recogizabe armors that take more focus to control, leaving Tony the 40 Explaining a discrepancy in reporting... Tony does have 47, but he's left with 40 when Jarvis takes control of 7 of them for the very end. These 7 are the ones that will be more recognizable and Tony did have full control of them a little earlier.

Essentially Jarvis and Pepper both join the battle, as well as Rhodes.
All Tony's allies are needed to stop Mandarin and he even has to hand over full control of some of the suits to Jarvis.

I think the importance of AI will be seen in Avengers 2 and some of Winter Soldier. Modok might also be coming into this faster than we think... However, I think we may only see Modok on the Shield show as one of the reappearing villains who don't show up in the movies, but affect what happens in small ways. The show may fill in some background info on what has been happening with AIM and Shield in the past, and now the present (since Avengers) and in between movies. But Modok's parts on the show would take place after Tetterington's transformation, which happens sometime between the end of IM3 and Winter Soldier and has something to do with Extremis tests gone wrong now.. making Modok sort of a biological computer.

Anyone know if Maria Hill is actually in this movie as per early rumors at screen-rant? I know she'll be on the Shield show sometimes. At this point I think it's almost a certainty the show goes forward...

I think AIM might be placed as the main villains of the show, at least every once in a while as a continuing threat, while Shield deals with other things on other weeks. Like when Loki is asked about where he recruited his AIM mercenaries from in Avengers: "Shield has many enemies".

I like where you are going with alot of this stuff Loki. I feel as though Marvel is in a better place now then they were when they started filming the movies for phase 1. Before the success of Iron Man and the semi-success of the incredible hulk, it was not a sure thing that they would be able to pull off what they eventually did with The Avengers. Had those two movies not been as successful as they were, I don't think we would be where we are now, we probably wouldn't have even had an Avengers movie. I think a big reason why Whedon was given big picture control over all phase 2 movies, was because Marvel now knows they have an opportunity to not only put out really good individual movies, but also interweave subplots from those movies in order to progress the entirety of the MCU.

That being said, I think that we will start to see smaller subplots in these movies that expand upon the MCU as we know it. I like the idea of introducing Jan in Iron Man 3 as you have described it. It adds mystery to the character, and if its revealed that she is Jan after the credits, it will create more buzz for Ant Man. I know alot of people are complaining that Jan shouldn't be in an Iron Man movie because shes not in the Iron Man comics, but consider this: Besides the Avengers, Iron Man is Marvels most successful character. I know plenty of people that loved the Avengers but hadn't seen Thor, Incredible Hulk, or Captain America. Introducing characters in the Iron Man films so that they can be used later in Avengers films makes the most sense because the Iron Man films draw the wider audiences.

I like the idea of having Ant Man split between pre-iron man 3 and post iron man 3. It allows for the characters to be used in the Avengers 2, creating more buzz for the characters before the release of Ant Man. It makes the origin movie easier, because it allows for a character that some might consider "boring" to avoid the long character introduction in their own movie. The audience, having seen the Avengers 2, would already know who these characters are, and would leave more time for plot and possibly the introduction of Scott Lang.

The only problem I have with your idea is with Ultron. I do believe that Ultron, should and will be a part of the MCU. He needs to a villain in an avengers film. While I do agree that introducing Jan in Iron Man makes sense, I do not think introducing Ultron in Iron Man does. I think that given the introduction of Thanos in the Avengers and the push Marvel is making for Guardians of the Galaxy, it would be too much to also throw Ultron in the mix for phase 2. I think that if we see Ultron duking it out with the Avengers it won't be until 3. I will say that I do like the idea of subtly introducing an unnamed AI into Iron Man 3 could work, if Jan is also introduced.

I think with Iron Man 3, Tony could go through the Extremis process after being confronted with the AI. Maybe his AI for the new armor becomes overly aggressive (the armor attacking Pepper in bed). Maybe Mandarin steals this AI and merges it with AIM AI, forcing Tony to come up with a new way to control his armor, enter Extremis. Rather than using JARVIS (maybe JARVIS is destroyed/taken/corrupted during the film) he goes through the Extremis process so that he no longer needs his AI to fight as Iron Man. This may also explain why we have seen nothing as far as an additional armor that we would see at the end of the film. He doesn't create a new armor, he just has a new way to interact with his armor that makes him faster and allows him to be directly connected to not only his own armor, but all his other armors.

I think that when Ultron is introduced we will see either JARVIS or Coulson turned into the vision, depending on how they explain Coulson's return on the SHIELD show. We could also see and old iron man armor/ mandarin armor, that becomes the shell of Ultron. But the main reason I think we won't see Ultron until the Avengers 3 is because they want to introduce Black Panther first. I feel that an Avengers 3 plot with Ultron would include the creation of the Vision, with his objective being the destruction of the Avengers and the creation of a new body. And Ultron was always trying to use materials such as adamantium to become the ultimate machine. While adamantium won't be included in an avengers movie, we could see Ultron attempt to build a body made of Vibranium. The source of said Vibranium, Wakanda. I always pictured a black panther movie starting with Howard Stark visiting Wakanda and saving a Wakandan (T'Challa maybe?), for doing this he is given Vibranium which he used to make Cap's shield.

I like where you are going with alot of this stuff Loki. I feel as though Marvel is in a better place now then they were when they started filming the movies for phase 1. Before the success of Iron Man and the semi-success of the incredible hulk, it was not a sure thing that they would be able to pull off what they eventually did with The Avengers. Had those two movies not been as successful as they were, I don't think we would be where we are now, we probably wouldn't have even had an Avengers movie. I think a big reason why Whedon was given big picture control over all phase 2 movies, was because Marvel now knows they have an opportunity to not only put out really good individual movies, but also interweave subplots from those movies in order to progress the entirety of the MCU.

That being said, I think that we will start to see smaller subplots in these movies that expand upon the MCU as we know it. I like the idea of introducing Jan in Iron Man 3 as you have described it. It adds mystery to the character, and if its revealed that she is Jan after the credits, it will create more buzz for Ant Man. I know alot of people are complaining that Jan shouldn't be in an Iron Man movie because shes not in the Iron Man comics, but consider this: Besides the Avengers, Iron Man is Marvels most successful character. I know plenty of people that loved the Avengers but hadn't seen Thor, Incredible Hulk, or Captain America. Introducing characters in the Iron Man films so that they can be used later in Avengers films makes the most sense because the Iron Man films draw the wider audiences.

I like the idea of having Ant Man split between pre-iron man 3 and post iron man 3. It allows for the characters to be used in the Avengers 2, creating more buzz for the characters before the release of Ant Man. It makes the origin movie easier, because it allows for a character that some might consider "boring" to avoid the long character introduction in their own movie. The audience, having seen the Avengers 2, would already know who these characters are, and would leave more time for plot and possibly the introduction of Scott Lang.

The only problem I have with your idea is with Ultron. I do believe that Ultron, should and will be a part of the MCU. He needs to a villain in an avengers film. While I do agree that introducing Jan in Iron Man makes sense, I do not think introducing Ultron in Iron Man does. I think that given the introduction of Thanos in the Avengers and the push Marvel is making for Guardians of the Galaxy, it would be too much to also throw Ultron in the mix for phase 2. I think that if we see Ultron duking it out with the Avengers it won't be until 3. I will say that I do like the idea of subtly introducing an unnamed AI into Iron Man 3 could work, if Jan is also introduced.

I think with Iron Man 3, Tony could go through the Extremis process after being confronted with the AI. Maybe his AI for the new armor becomes overly aggressive (the armor attacking Pepper in bed). Maybe Mandarin steals this AI and merges it with AIM AI, forcing Tony to come up with a new way to control his armor, enter Extremis. Rather than using JARVIS (maybe JARVIS is destroyed/taken/corrupted during the film) he goes through the Extremis process so that he no longer needs his AI to fight as Iron Man. This may also explain why we have seen nothing as far as an additional armor that we would see at the end of the film. He doesn't create a new armor, he just has a new way to interact with his armor that makes him faster and allows him to be directly connected to not only his own armor, but all his other armors.

I think that when Ultron is introduced we will see either JARVIS or Coulson turned into the vision, depending on how they explain Coulson's return on the SHIELD show. We could also see and old iron man armor/ mandarin armor, that becomes the shell of Ultron. But the main reason I think we won't see Ultron until the Avengers 3 is because they want to introduce Black Panther first. I feel that an Avengers 3 plot with Ultron would include the creation of the Vision, with his objective being the destruction of the Avengers and the creation of a new body. And Ultron was always trying to use materials such as adamantium to become the ultimate machine. While adamantium won't be included in an avengers movie, we could see Ultron attempt to build a body made of Vibranium. The source of said Vibranium, Wakanda. I always pictured a black panther movie starting with Howard Stark visiting Wakanda and saving a Wakandan (T'Challa maybe?), for doing this he is given Vibranium which he used to make Cap's shield.

Yeah I think they have a lot of opportunities now to go even bigger with a lot of the individual movies, the subplots, and Avengers 2.
But I think the main thing would be keeping the Shield show connected but not too connected to the movies and the movie characters/villains.

So using AIM as a secret organization that has worldwide fronts set up might work well in keeping the Shield agents dealing with rogue scientists and low level villains like Modok for the first season that are connected to what's going on in the movies, but you wouldn't need to know what Modok was doing to understand AIM's role in future movies, which might eventually become Hydra anyway.

With the whole coulson thing I think it has to be a life model decoy in some way as some are saying. I don't know for sure but I think they'd each have a hand in turning vision good if Vision comes into this, but I think Ultron would create the evil version of Vision that the other AI characters help change good. It's not really surprising that he's alive, or back, I think they want some continuity with the movies but they may want to keep the show a little self-contained. So there can be different branches to AIM for now until we find out they're actually a front for hydra in one of the movies much further down the road. We could potentially see a lot of villain appearances in the show that we won't get in the movies that don't have to be connected to the movies. As well as some of the hero characters they wanted to bring to TV. But I think there could even be more villains appearing than heroes that Shield agents can confront alone, or have certain characters cameo and help out with. I wouldn't count out seeing Wonderman somewhere if marvel really wants to bring in Vision later on. Villains like Modok who may have been looked at for CA2 at one point may be moved to the show, or are lesser villains Shield faces along with AIM.

They've said Avengers 2 would be more personal. Personally, I think that's code for Ultron, but we can't forget Thanos and his payback. I think it's also personal between Shield and AIM.

Add Pym to that because there might be the introduction of Pym there, since the Ant man movie comes out right after Avengers 2, but yeah maybe not the vision yet.
So Ultron becomes a personal thing for the newly introduced Pym, and Thanos is a returning threat for the Avengers. But having a story that involves Ultron and Thanos and setting up Ultron for the movie would require some setup in the phase 2 movies. That's why I believe Pym has worked for both Shield and AIM.

I think if we see Pym in Avengers 2 Ultron makes the most sense if they're considering another villain alongside Thanos.

The thing about Ultron is they may want him in a number of movies like Loki.
So he very well could show up again if they use him in Avengers 2.

When Whedon said he had a plan to put another villain in Avengers it appeared in the same article that mentioned his very Waspy draft of Avengers.
He said that he didn't want to name that villain because that villain may crop up in future movies.

But because he was talking about Wasp there's a hint there about how Wasp may have been intended to be introduced as an adversary of this villain.

There may even be an Ultron easter egg in The Avengers.

And with the Black Panther/ Wakanda stuff I can see them being pretty close to comic accuracy as they are with many things, so they could potentially have Ultron return yet again in a masters of evil movie around the time Black Panther has been introduced in phase 3. The MoE movie would either be Avengers 3 (if they don't go with the Gauntlet and Thanos returning again), or CA3 would be like a mini Masters of Evil movie where many of the sidekicks have to help Cap, Falcon, and Bucky. In essence Black Widow, and War Machine would join Cap as he leads the non- main avenger heroes against an attack by Red Skull and the Masters. The other Avengers are busy this time. War machine has dealt with Mandarin before and is closer to Cap and Shield when the Masters suddenly reveal themselves, and each of the people joining the cast would add to the team. Wasp could join this CA3, as well as Sif from the Thor cast to deal with Enchantress, as the Sif-Thor relationship may be furthered by that point.. So imo the masters of evil movie will either be Cap3 or Avengers 3 and Black Panther will have a part in it regardless. With a returning Ultron and many other villains.

I think Ultron is obviously a good choice for returning avengers villain... but that being said... Since FOX most likely has Annihilus... it wouldn't hurt to expand Ultron's part of "Annihilation" in a future GOTG movie

unfortunately Marvel can't use three of the best space villains... (Galactus, SuperSkrull, and Annihilus)

They may not be able to use Kang either because of his relationship with Reed and the FF. I think we might see Annihilus in the new Fantastic Four, however I'm pretty sure they're considering Kang too..

They may be joining X men and Fantastic Four eventually over at Fox with some of the time travel/timeline stuff being planned... Which led to an agreement on Marvel's end, and Fox's over certain characters they were trying to acquire. While Surfer and Galactus remain in their possession, I don't want to say too much at this point but Fox really wants to keep those fantastic four characters in play and separate them from what came before just as much as they're attempting with the x men time travel stuff overcoming the last stand. They'd still control the film rights to certain characters, and they may not have even been willing to just hand over Kang without putting up a challenge.

This means basically we may see Kang in the fantastic four movie(s) talking about how timelines all around the marvel universe have been skewed. FF & X men may be working towards an Age of Apocalypse team up movie after DoFP & the FF reboot.

It's not fox and Marvel working together but coming to an arrangement over certain characters, which would allow both film companies to depict Kang and some of the space characters differently. Clarifying through Kang that they exist in alternate timelines, and alternate film verses, where they're closer to the Age of Apocalyse and Days of Future past future the mutants/FF eventually witness. Instead of the Thanos and Age of Ultron futures the Guardians/Alternate 31st century Guardians, and Avengers witness.

Some of Kang's other forms may be fair game after they tried to get Surfer and Galactus from Fox and this led to an agreement over some characters.

Marvel might not be able to use Kang, but a deal might have been worked out to use another version of Kang & the name Immortus in phase 3 or the post credits to a phase 2 movie. Immortus would have a lot to do with the Guardians, Magus, the 31st century guardians, Thanos, Korvac, and Pym...

The thing about Immortus vs Kang is that Immortus has already traveled time and meditated for many years to become at one with himself. He's been to the dawn of time, knows of the threats coming from that direction in Thor's movies. He's a guardian of this timeline in some ways but he thinks that the Avengers announcing themselves to other worlds has put a certain chain of events in motion. In GoTG he sets up Magus/Korvac against Thanos... He knows Thanos has plans to acquire the gauntlet and this creates the horrible version of the 31st century that the future guardians are from. They contact the past members through knowwhere after they deal with Thanos the first time. Immortus isn't really a bad guy, although he has tried to stop the Avengers from forming throughout the years and his counterpart in the 31st century was a badguy.

Immortus is actually one of the better versions of Kang, he may see the use of timetravel only to alter the events of the final showdown with Thanos because he can't let Thanos destroy half the universe with Gauntlet and ruin the future for the future Guardians, all his selves, and all the influence he's held on preserving the timeline thus far. He realizes his mistake and that Pym is necessary to stop Ultron, save the timeline, and possibly important in defeating Thanos.

In this story his only evil is interfering with Pym's past and being the true reason Pym wasn't there since the beginning and separating him from Wasp, also accidentally created the Age of Ultron by stalling Pym's progress as a hero and making him unsure about becoming a hero + allowing part of Ultron to time-travel to the 31st century... and back again.

They may not be able to use Kang either because of his relationship with Reed and the FF. I think we might see Annihilus in the new Fantastic Four, however I'm pretty sure they're considering Kang too..

They may be joining X men and Fantastic Four eventually over at Fox with some of the time travel/timeline stuff being planned... Which led to an agreement on Marvel's end, and Fox's over certain characters they were trying to acquire. While Surfer and Galactus remain in their possession, I don't want to say too much at this point but Fox really wants to keep those fantastic four characters in play and separate them from what came before just as much as they're attempting with the x men time travel stuff overcoming the last stand. They'd still control the film rights to certain characters, and they may not have even been willing to just hand over Kang without putting up a challenge.

This means basically we may see Kang in the fantastic four movie(s) talking about how timelines all around the marvel universe have been skewed. FF & X men may be working towards an Age of Apocalypse team up movie after DoFP & the FF reboot.

It's not fox and Marvel working together but coming to an arrangement over certain characters, which would allow both film companies to depict Kang and some of the space characters differently. Clarifying through Kang that they exist in alternate timelines, and alternate film verses, where they're closer to the Age of Apocalyse and Days of Future past future the mutants/FF eventually witness. Instead of the Thanos and Age of Ultron futures the Guardians/Alternate 31st century Guardians, and Avengers witness.

Some of Kang's other forms may be fair game after they tried to get Surfer and Galactus from Fox and this led to an agreement over some characters.

Marvel might not be able to use Kang, but a deal might have been worked out to use another version of Kang & the name Immortus in phase 3 or the post credits to a phase 2 movie. Immortus would have a lot to do with the Guardians, Magus, the 31st century guardians, Thanos, Korvac, and Pym...

The thing about Immortus vs Kang is that Immortus has already traveled time and meditated for many years to become at one with himself. He's been to the dawn of time, knows of the threats coming from that direction in Thor's movies. He's a guardian of this timeline in some ways but he thinks that the Avengers announcing themselves to other worlds has put a certain chain of events in motion. In GoTG he sets up Magus/Korvac against Thanos... He knows Thanos has plans to acquire the gauntlet and this creates the horrible version of the 31st century that the future guardians are from. They contact the past members through knowwhere after they deal with Thanos the first time. Immortus isn't really a bad guy, although he has tried to stop the Avengers from forming throughout the years and his counterpart in the 31st century was a badguy.

Immortus is actually one of the better versions of Kang, he may see the use of timetravel only to alter the events of the final showdown with Thanos because he can't let Thanos destroy half the universe with Gauntlet and ruin the future for the future Guardians, all his selves, and all the influence he's held on preserving the timeline thus far. He realizes his mistake and that Pym is necessary to stop Ultron, save the timeline, and possibly important in defeating Thanos.

In this story his only evil is interfering with Pym's past and being the true reason Pym wasn't there since the beginning and separating him from Wasp, also accidentally created the Age of Ultron by stalling Pym's progress as a hero and making him unsure about becoming a hero + allowing part of Ultron to time-travel to the 31st century... and back again.

But he's related to Reed Richards and a standard attack from Kang's army might work better in Fantastic Four, since we've already been introduced to Thanos and space threats over here, and that property plays off of the family themes...

So Kang would actually be the descendant over there, whereas here they wouldn't really bring it up because time travel has allowed him to instantly (from this perspective) become Immortus, a far less evil version of the character (possibly important in stopping a gauntlet wielding Thanos).

Basically I'm saying Fox didn't entirely reject the Galactus and Surfer thing because neither side knew who had the rights to Kang, as he's a major villain to both, even more so than Doom. And could go either way/wasn't outlined at first, and fell under marvel's property as a bargaining chip...

So they gave up the name Kang and retained the option to possibly use the name Immortus in return for one of the things they wanted... without any dollars being exchanged. And a deal possibly in place to allow each series to use their own versions of galactus and surfer + explain them as parts of alternate timelines onscreen and be able to share a lot of other space names. While Fantastic Four gets to focus on skrulls, annihilus and Kang completely... meaning Marvel no longer references the skrulls in their movies. We have their alternate version the chitauri already in place. Some of their background still mysterious and sporting a look like the pharaohs of old... i.e. Fury has a lot more secrets he's not willing to share and was very much aware someone would come for the tesseract eventually when he started the Avengers initiative, again going back to them not knowing they're part of a bigger world now. Where Pym and Jan have already had their powers for a while, Thanos's origin on Titan and much more has already taken place.

Korvac, Magus and the universal truth guard a truth about the nature of Thanos and the Universe, sent to them from the 31st century.
Korvac and Magus come about as time anomalies in the GoTG movie, and Thanos is more of an anti-villain. Although the guardians don't know Thanos is the real threat and they're helping him against those Immortus created out of a time anomaly while playing grandfather time to stop Thanos's rise. The guardians realize Thanos is now partially their responsibility. They took out Korvac and Magus who were intended to stop Thanos from ever succeeding in his early goals and only learn of this once Warlock joins. Korvac is the one who has a relationship with the power cosmic fox may have allowed marvel to use..

See I'm thinking it's already the other way around... Kang has already been everywhere in the MCU and they planned for this with The Avengers. When Fury brings up his line about the "pharaohs of old" and things being buried I think it'll thematically tie into some of these secrets and why the Ant and boot lines are so important.

He was aleady Rama Tut, long before his influence on the timeline was buried like the pharaoh he once was, but he diverged that timeline, gave up power and the result is the Immortus we see in Marvel's movies. Has become a lot wiser. He's sort of like the beyonder or the being that set up Korvac, grandfather time, and the being that set up Magus as characters involved with time travel or time paradoxes. The kicker would be he's been working against Thanos this whole time, making slight adjustments to the timeline and acting sort of in unison with the beyonder.

One version of Kang masquerading as the being from before time Cthon created the alternate version of the skrulls and gave them their Egyptian look.... put them in Thanos's charge. Immortus is playing a very dangerous game against Thanos until the very end because this isn't Kang, it's Immortus who watches over millions of years of progression and tries to preserve timelines once he learns to stop messing with them too much.

See I'm thinking it's already the other way around... Kang has already been everywhere in the MCU and they planned for this with The Avengers. When Fury brings up his line about the "pharaohs of old" and things being buried I think it'll thematically tie into some of these secrets and why the Ant and boot lines are so important.

He was aleady Rama Tut, long before his influence on the timeline was buried like the pharaoh he once was, but he diverged that timeline, gave up power and the result is the Immortus we see in Marvel's movies. Has become a lot wiser. He's sort of like the beyonder or the being that set up Korvac, grandfather time, and the being that set up Magus as characters involved with time travel or time paradoxes. The kicker would be he's been working against Thanos this whole time, making slight adjustments to the timeline and acting sort of in unison with the beyonder.

One version of Kang masquerading as the being from before time Cthon created the alternate version of the skrulls and gave them their Egyptian look.... put them in Thanos's charge. Immortus is playing a very dangerous game against Thanos until the very end because this isn't Kang, it's Immortus who watches over millions of years of progression and tries to preserve timelines once he learns to stop messing with them.

I see what you're doing (again) but I don't think Kang is happening any time soon... nor does have he have SQUAT to do with IM3

Not that he would be involved in IM3 but with a character like Immortus they could approach time travel very differently than what Fox is doing. In this timeline Kang would have only operated in the extreme future and past before becoming Immortus and preserving a lot of this major section of the timeline. So he would know all about Thanos's rise. His influence could then in theory be felt over many of the movies in the series and explains why things happen slightly out of order, but usually in accordance with canon... It could be why Ultron is now with the mandarin, if it is, and why Wasp is briefly in this movie, if she is. But no, Immortus wouldn't come into it yet. This would be something they're a bigger part of that even Fury doesn't know all of the meaning to yet. "The tesseract affects everyone differently." Fury grabbed it, and found out a little more. "They'll return because we'll need them too" could really be viewed as a promise and true foresight, and not a bet or statement, in retrospect of what I'm outlining.

Some of the elements are too similar if they are using a version of the future guardians. What if someone else is going up into space but won't be part of the present guardians team? Astro separated by a lot of time and ending up on the future guardians team with no way to contact Earth about what will befall them, but a way to contact the Guardians in the past. No one would really do any time traveling, for the effects of time travel in this series would have already happened for the most part... and are incredibly buried as Immortus is only subtly revealed to have influenced things and decides to help the Avengers and Guardians work together in a Beyonder like way.

only in spoiler tags for those interested in brushing up on Immortus and the Avengers in particular and not Kang

Spoiler!!! Click to Read!:

"Deep in Earth’s future, the time-traveling conqueror Kang came to find his excursions into time left him unfulfilled, and he decided to give up worldly conquests and meditate on the nature of time until the end of his days. Thus, he journeyed to Limbo, a dimension that exists outside the timestream itself and built a castle, lording over the wanders of Limbo, the Space Phantoms. At some point after this, Immortus was contacted by the trinity of beings known as the Time-Keepers to oversee the 80 millenia of their existence and keep humanity (and especially the hero team known as the Avengers) from expanding into space-- a prospect of which would have disastrous prospects in nearly 50% of all the multiverse. Immortus acted as "custodian" of this timeline, and acted many times to influence events that keep humans from exploring space, all under the guise of embarking “on a number of campaigns to untangle the skein of timelines."

These early machinations included sending a Space Phantom to break up an early incarnation of the Avengers and helping the early version of the Masters of Evil. During this last excursion, Immortus witnessed the bravery of Captain America, which forever would allow him a grudging respect for the Avengers. Thus, instead of destroying the Avengers, Immortus would subversively shepherd them to his own ends, such as manipulating events so that Thor would relinquish his hammer's time-travelling capabilities.
Immortus also set out so that the Scarlet Witch would not conceive children (who have the potential to stand among the greatest forces of the universe.) Immortus helped to instigate the relationship between the Scarlet Witch and the Vision, thinking that no children would be born of this union, and Immortus officiated the ceremony that married the two. When this tactic failed, Immortus investigated the origin of the children, and manipulated events to reveal that the children were in fact pieces of the demon Mephisto's soul. Immortus also took the opportunity to influence the dismantling of the Vision's robotic body and mind. Immortus tried to stop the Scarlet Witch once and for all banishing her from reality, but was instead seemingly banished himself. Immortus was saved by the Time Keepers and re-instated as their custodian."

What I'm talking about is merging Immortus and his wanting to prevent half the multiverse from being destroyed with Thanos getting the Gauntlet, and the alternate future of the Guardians in the 31st century. What Thanos will do changes the future for Kang, and he becomes more of a force for good in this series than most versions of Kang.

Understood, lol, but if you're paying attention it's all connected. They really are part of a bigger world now, and although casual fans won't know it, and the characters themselves won't. You will understand what I'm talking about when you see IM3, and why my speculation's skewed so many different directions or could lead a lot of different ways because of some Advanced Idea Mechanics. But it's all connected. Labeling them as phases just shows you this is all still partially Feige's plan too... and he had every intention of making us think they weren't gonna use the Mandarin, for a short while. When it's clear as day it was the plan for the third movie all along with the 10 rings clues. In short, the clues may be even less obvious or some will jump out at you but they'll always be planting connections to the sequels and setups that connect to the broader universe. Including most likely leaving Mandarin alive in some form for a possible MoE

I'm trying to reveal things like Thanos is not the villain in GoTG in a roundabout way by posting in threads where it won't get too much attention this early.

Understood, lol, but if you're paying attention it's all connected. They really are part of a bigger world now, and although casual fans won't know it, and the characters themselves won't. You will understand what I'm talking about when you see IM3, and why my speculation's skewed so many different directions or could lead a lot of different ways because of some Advanced Idea Mechanics. But it's all connected. Labeling them as phases just shows you this is all still partially Feige's plan too... and he had every intention of making us think they weren't gonna use the Mandarin. When it's clear as day it was the plan for the third movie all along with the 10 rings clues. In short, the clues may be even less obvious or some will jump out at you but they'll always be planting connections to the sequels and setups that connect to the broader universe.

I'm trying to reveal things like Thanos is not the villain in GoTG in a roundabout way by posting in threads where it won't get too much attention this early.

Connected or not.. lets try to keep on topic to the film in question rather than "all the films in question" isn't there an MCU thread?

Connected or not.. lets try to keep on topic to the film in question rather than "all the films in question" isn't there an MCU thread?

Not really, no.
I suppose one of the Avengers threads would be the best bet to keep news and speculation about the MCU in general.

I gotta admit I'm interested in hearing more about the Kang/Immortus/Rama-Tut angle from LokiD, though. As long as we agree it's just speculation at this point, and not try to play it off as inside info....

I'm not too sure, I will try to limit my stuff about the other movies or post in the Avengers 2 thread or something.

I'd just basically be saying what I've already said about this movie and things like ColdBlood having the thing Stane had from IM1, being one of the first people with mandarin's form of Extremis and how mandarin may have control of an almost uncountable number of soldiers, things and organizations, tying into what the synopsis says about his reach having no bounds. So he would have initially been an archaeologist studying the rings that are semi-ancient in origin with more modern man made inscriptions that intrigue Mandi and not revealed whether alien metal or otherwise. And the rings themselves have moved across time and Mandarin acquires them from their last owners in India. The archaeologist part of his backstory is preserved but he possibly takes interest in the metal these rings seem to be made out of. And knows there is more to the history of the world, and much that is being hidden, linking back to the Atlantis easter eggs. AIM has similar ideas for the future as Mandirin, but Mandi learns from the past.

Not really, no.
I suppose one of the Avengers threads would be the best bet to keep news and speculation about the MCU in general.

I gotta admit I'm interested in hearing more about the Kang/Immortus/Rama-Tut angle from LokiD, though. As long as we agree it's just speculation at this point, and not try to play it off as inside info....

oh trust me i like hearing it too.. but it really has nothing to do with IRON MAN film series..

i know there's a Misc Marvel Films section... which at this point SHOULD probably be renamed "The MCU" section or something since the only properties marvel doesn't own are X-men, Spidey, Fan 4 and Ghostrider.... which all now have there own forums. Mods? can you help us out with that?

oh trust me i like hearing it too.. but it really has nothing to do with IRON MAN film series..

i know there's a Misc Marvel Films section... which at this point SHOULD probably be renamed "The MCU" section or something since the only properties marvel doesn't own are X-men, Spidey, Fan 4 and Ghostrider.... which all now have there own forums. Mods? can you help us out with that?

I think there is some value to keeping the larger MCU in mind when discussing individual MCU films/franchises, but it obviously should not be the focus of all of our discussion in this thread in particular. A lot of us love to look at the MCU films as one long franchise, but I actually think it's more appropriate to discuss how IM3 fits into that narrative in the Iron Man 3 subforum than it is to discuss it in the Marvel Films forum. Maybe all it takes is a "How does IM3 fit into the MCU narrative/Phase II?" thread that is separate from this one. Or maybe I'm wrong.

I think there is some value to keeping the larger MCU in mind when discussing individual MCU films/franchises, but it obviously should not be the focus of all of our discussion in this thread in particular. A lot of us love to look at the MCU films as one long franchise, but I actually think it's more appropriate to discuss how IM3 fits into that narrative in the Iron Man 3 subforum than it is to discuss it in the Marvel Films forum. Maybe all it takes is a "How does IM3 fit into the MCU narrative/Phase II?" thread that is separate from this one. Or maybe I'm wrong.

oh and don't get me wrong that makes sense to me... when we discussed ultron it was grounded with info we know from IM3 or speculating.. the Kang stuff doesn't seem so as much imo... it's extremely loose

oh and don't get me wrong that makes sense to me... when we discussed ultron it was grounded with info we know from IM3 or speculating.. the Kang stuff doesn't seem so as much imo... it's extremely loose

Yeah, I agree... There's definitely a lot of stretching going on, and this isn't a yoga class.

Not really, no.
I gotta admit I'm interested in hearing more about the Kang/Immortus/Rama-Tut angle from LokiD, though. As long as we agree it's just speculation at this point, and not try to play it off as inside info....

It would tie into some of Mandarin's back story, basically Immortus had already been traveling across time helping out conquerors, stealing power from them, and sometimes posing as the past conquerors, spreaders of evil. All of the old masters of their parts of the globe until they overextended themselves or made other mistakes Mandarin teaches lessons about in not repeating history

Immortus was not only Rama Tut in this series but he also quickly skipped to other time periods of the past and went through a phase where he was Alexander the Great and fought the Persians. Nothing he did affected the course of history directly but some small things crept in. he couldn't alter much because he was skipping time and running from the Other, his Other he accidentally gave life when he visited the Dawn of time who is joined to him, and hid in every empire of Earth's history... Those considered great and those considered not so great conquerors, and his ancestor Genghis Khan. Hill/Shield and the Atlanteans/Oracle know some of this, despite Fury's best efforts, as well as probably Wakanda with their advanced Science and communication with the other hidden powers of the world. It's the old conquerors that the Mandarin is interested in, but his focus later on would be ushering along the new masters of evil. The old conquerors would be the old masters of evil, who Immortus allied himself with for a while. Immortus didn't realize he indirectly formed the masters of Evil by affecting Mandarin's ancestor and altering some of his beliefs about the rings.. The rings work, mandarin just doesn't know they do until working with the masters several movies down the line...

Immortus also may have secretly ruled over Genghis Khan's period in history and influences the Mandarin that way through his knowledge of the past and all the past rulers Mandarin studies and studying the rings influenced him to become a terrorist and conqueror. The Mandarin also claims descent from some these other rulers, great Chinese Emperors, and says his bloodline has traveled across the globe, making him a mixture of many cultures, though he expresses his connection to Genghis Khan and Chinese Emperors. Mandarin claims he's also got the bloodline of Alexander the great in him and is intended to lead but wants technology to lead. So basically Immortus became an ancestor of this version of the Mandarin, and Mandarin sees himself as a conqueror and Emperor. Like Genghis Khan he gathers a number of new technologies through his conquests, adopts them, and uses them against his opponents.
Basically Immortus would have been forced to repeat history, and had purposely overextended himself in a number of those Empires and committed the exact same mistakes mandarin is talkiing about not making, on purpose to ensure history could progress and to prevent the Other from the dawn of time from working a lot of magic in this realm. He can't stop the Other from entering Asgard and whispering into the Ears of the Vanir who read prophecy like the people who used to think you could read the future through the cracks in bones in Asian cultures. Explaining some of the more modern/ancient elements in some Thor 2 stuff that actually moved there from the past and future a long time ago, but wouldn't be revealed until Immortus's time travel exploits are revealed.
The Other even tried to use others to take over and conquer Asgard, this time for Thanos because he's working the Titan, and trying to affect powerful leaders from a time as far back as Surtur.

It would tie into some of Mandarin's back story, basically Immortus had already been traveling across time helping out conquerors, stealing power from them, and sometimes posing as the past conquerors, spreaders of evil. All of the old masters of their parts of the globe until they overextended themselves or made other mistakes Mandarin teaches lessons about in not repeating history

Immortus was not only Rama Tut in this series but he also quickly skipped to other time periods of the past and went through a phase where he was Alexander the Great and fought the Persians. Nothing he did affected the course of history directly but some small things crept in. he couldn't alter much because he was skipping time and running from the Other, his Other he accidentally gave life when he visited the Dawn of time who is joined to him, and hid in every empire of Earth's history... Those considered great and those considered not so great conquerors, and his ancestor Genghis Khan. Hill/Shield and the Atlanteans/Oracle know some of this, despite Fury's best efforts, as well as probably Wakanda with their advanced Science and communication with the other hidden powers of the world. It's the old conquerors that the Mandarin is interested in, but his focus later on would be ushering along the new masters of evil. The old conquerors would be the old masters of evil, who Immortus allied himself with for a while. Immortus didn't realize he indirectly formed the masters of Evil by affecting Mandarin's ancestor and altering some of his beliefs about the rings.. The rings work, mandarin just doesn't know they do until working with the masters several movies down the line...

Immortus also may have secretly ruled over Genghis Khan's period in history and influences the Mandarin that way through his knowledge of the past and all the past rulers Mandarin studies and studying the rings influenced him to become a terrorist and conqueror. The Mandarin also claims descent from some these other rulers, great Chinese Emperors, and says his bloodline has traveled across the globe, making him a mixture of many cultures, though he expresses his connection to Genghis Khan and Chinese Emperors. Mandarin claims he's also got the bloodline of Alexander the great in him and is intended to lead but wants technology to lead. So basically Immortus became an ancestor of this version of the Mandarin, and Mandarin sees himself as a conqueror and Emperor. Like Genghis Khan he gathers a number of new technologies through his conquests, adopts them, and uses them against his opponents.
Basically Immortus would have been forced to repeat history, and had purposely overextended himself in a number of those Empires and committed the exact same mistakes mandarin is talkiing about not making, on purpose to ensure history could progress and to prevent the Other from the dawn of time from working a lot of magic in this realm. He can't stop the Other from entering Asgard and whispering into the Ears of the Vanir who read prophecy like the people who used to think you could read the future through the cracks in bones in Asian cultures. Explaining some of the more modern/ancient elements in some Thor 2 stuff that actually moved there from the past and future a long time ago, but wouldn't be revealed until Immortus's time travel exploits are revealed.
The Other even tried to use others to take over and conquer Asgard, this time for Thanos because he's working the Titan, and trying to affect powerful leaders from a time as far back as Surtur.

so, the waitress from the trailer is Kang now and no longer Wasp, I see

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It wasn't Marvel Studios that made me a Marvel Zombie, it was every other movie studio failing at making superhero movies as good as them! ------------------------------

Lol no. The Other is the only Other version of Kang we'll see because Kang killed off all the other doubles during his time travel and this one became the body of the being known as Chthon accidentally during the dawn of time. Who represents aspects of black magic and the dark matter side of physical existence. He accidentally became Mandarin's ancestor but this wouldn't be revealed until it's revealed he has been shepherding the timeline like Beyonder, and was running across time from beings from beyond time that want to see the universe destroyed. Would very much like to see Thanos do that.

He travels time too and looks for powerful leaders, kings, conquerors and Titans, as well other powerful entities to try to aid his cause which is the destruction of all matter... he's anti-matter, dark matter, spaces in between connected to the dark world, dark magic, and prophecy. basically he looks for powerful villains to make more villainous.

When he speaks to Loki on the astral plane that is going on within Yggdrasil, through the roots of the world tree. On the inside. Within Loki's mind. The Other version of him influences people from any time period, any space, and dragged Loki out of that black hole... and returned him to the universe, forcing him to serve a being he had never met from very far away.
The "space" scene where Loki talks to the Other is actually going on within Loki's head which is why it looks like his head hurts after, and The Other is very powerful ancient being who can only work through people or with people...

In theory it could possess a weaker mind, but can only interface with stronger minds and meet them on astral planes, one of Chthons abilities the Other gained when it travelled to the dawn of time and fractured Kang. Which caused a split in the realm of black magic and alerts Strange and Ian Mcnee.

And Thanos may not be a main villain in Avengers 2. And in GoTG more of an anti-hero working against the church of universal truth for half of GoTG before he betrays the team, and they find out he was using them to eliminate Magus when Warlock returns from a time pocket.

Thanos will most likely still be a part of phase 3.
This is what Feige had to say, I'm jumping ahead too much--the key would be everything, many of the subplots, culminating in phase 3, and many things not being revealed until things culminate in later films. "Part of a bigger world, they just don't know it yet" and may not find out about things, although many things will be planted along the way:

“There’s a great track record now about lobbing something in at the last moment to get the audience buzzing[...] Particularly when it came to Thanos, [we knew] that most people in that audience had no idea who that purple guy was — but they could clearly tell he was important, and knew if they asked the two or three people sitting next to them, somebody would know who he was.
“Clearly, there’s a purpose to us putting him in the end of that movie. We do have plans for him[...] I wouldn’t say we ever feel the need to rush anything one way or the other. We succeeded in Phase One because we stuck to our guns and stuck to the plan. That plan took place over many, many years and it ultimately paid off. I see Phase Two unfolding in the same way of us taking our time, us doing what’s right for each individual movie, while folding in elements that will not only build up to the culmination of Phase Two, but even Phase Three.”

I'm working from the standpoint that there are some overall plans and things could go a few different ways and certain key parts have been put in place. While other things change or get shuffled forward like Wasp and the villain Whedon was talking about who wasn't Nebula but Nebula was supposed to be there with Thanos until the other came into the plan...

The Other has to be someone from the comics and has some sort of abilities that kind of hint at what he is. But Chthon is a red herring for those who may know the character and the Other name serves a dual purpose. His demonic appearance takes shape over time.
The Other also has to be important, he can't just be some random for them to have replaced Nebula with him very, very early on after the Zak Penn script was tossed. And Nebula will now show up in GoTG with the church and Magus or Korvac i believe, working both sides as she's really serving Thanos right now.